CLAUDINE'S DAUGHTER

A sequel to Warwyck's Woman (1978), this is a happy improvement over Laker's previous work. Lucy, left by her mother Claudine in an Italian convent at birth, weds a senile, impotent Italian nobleman; when he dies, she sets out to look for her roots in Victorian Easthampton--despite the trauma of having just been raped by her husband's loathsome son. Once in England, however, all the men worship gorgeous Lucy. A local nobleman dies while saving her from drowning; a buccaneering railroad entrepreneur turns her on despite her loathing of railroading's effect on the ecology; and one Richard Warwyck adores her. But don't they realize that incest lurks, that Lucy is the illegitimate issue of Claudine's brief but unforgettable affair with Richard's pugilist father Daniel? Didn't they read Warwyck's Woman Those who did--and even those who didn't--will find this a lively romance/scandal cheered along by full-scale displays of a seaside Brighton complete with bathing machines.